Happy Birthday Little Sister!

She was pretty cute then and she still is today! Happy birthday little sister, I hope know you are celebrating in style!

Studio Revamp

Where have the last two weeks gone? wait, three weeks? oh my.

I was out sick for a good week or so, including three days home from work and the discovery that sudafed is not remotely helpful for my particular body. After all that time on the couch, I was full of energy and immediately attached my studio, emptying it all out and then painting, a fabulous clean, bright white. I put up some shelves and made two desk areas.


How does this fit in that tiny room that was almost full to bursting before, you ask? Surprisingly well!


Apparently all the pictures I took are of the upper walls. You can see how seriously I take keeping paint off the ceiling. It actually has to be painted too at some point, so...


Did I ever tell you about my serger? I got a serger!

Collagraph

This one is actually from a couple years ago, but I recently scanned it and decided I might like it after all. Its funny how seeing something in a different context can change everything.


The "plate" was made with cardboard, glue, paper towel, tissue, and some cut shapes. Does that change it for you, knowing how humble are its origins?

Roses and Marigolds

New in my garden...



Summer sure is good.

Its June!

June is lovely, its hard to believe its here right now, but its lovely.


I spent most of this week being sicker than I have been in quite some time, which was not fun. But now I am feeling much much better and today was just so lovely, so things are looking up!

This evening I planted three tomato plants and 7 rows of carrots in my little garden, adding to the already planted broccoli, cucumbers, melons, radishes, lettuce, basil, sweet corn, parsley and flowers. That looks almost impressive listed out like that! Lots of things have already sprouted, and a few were transplants from my little peat pot starters. Now all thats left is planting pole beans in a pot to climb the back porch, and figuring out what to do with the herbs. And maybe some more flowers?

This is the first picture my grandparents ever made together, taken in 1937. On the back my grandma wrote "Just buddies!" - but I have seen her highschool text books where she practiced writing "Mrs. Harold Wright" and "Meryle Wright" over and over.


My grandfather was a wild youth in the back hills of Kentucky. Mommaw got her hands on him and straightened him out, a job she never gave up on for the rest of her life though he turned into the sweetest, most God-fearing man you could hope to find. They were such a pair, after 65 years of marriage I think they really felt they were a part of each other. The year and a half after Poppaw passed away, Mommaw seemed to have lost her will to live. I think all the difficult health problems she had dealt with for years had been tolerable when they were together, and then when she was caring for him, but without him there she gave in. We all knew that she was ready to go when she died peacefully in her sleep this past March.


I think I am lucky that the last few years my grandparents were alive I was old enough to know them for a little while as people, rather than as only my grandparents. Now I am able to look back and admire my grandmother's courage in living alone with her young daughter while her new husband was off in WWII. I am able to understand the hard work my grandfather put in to move his family from Kentucky farmlands to a comfortable suburban life in Cincinnati. When I remember them now, I remember my grandmother telling me of the latest historical novel she had been reading; I remember my grandfather staying up late at night to read his Bible; I remember my grandmother's beautifully elegant hands and my grandfather's hands skilled at carving and other wood crafts. As I grow older I understand the little bits of them that have passed down to me, and I am hopeful of continuing their tradition of strength in adversity, of hard work and perseverance and the basic - and to me admirable - realization of the American dream. My grandparents thought this country the best in the World, my grandfather fought for these ideals. I am much more cynical, but when I think of what they were able to accomplish, and the life they were able to build here, I am hopeful as well.

Goofiness

Today was one of those days where not much gets done. I had high hopes, but a series of absentmindedness and wasted time searching for things never found soon got me down. However, once I decided to just go with it all and gave up trying to accomplish the to-do list, I did have some goofy fun making this diploma for graduates of the School of Hard Knocks!


A colorful acquaintance once told me of her many years in the school of hard knocks, and ever since I have had the idea of this diploma in my head. Ta-da! I have made a button on the right sidebar for you to download a (blank of names) copy to present to your own graduate pal.